In this episode, we delve into the critical topic of workplace safety with Deb Bridges and Emily Etherington. They discuss practical strategies for creating a safer work environment, the importance of comprehensive safety programs, and how to communicate effectively with employees about safety regulations. The episode highlights the need for a collaborative approach between HR and safety professionals to foster a culture of safety within organizations.
GUESTS AT A GLANCE
Deb Bridges is a health and safety consultant at Safety Northwest, and Emily Etherington is an HR business partner at Xenium HR.
A QUICK GLIMPSE INTO OUR PODCAST
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PODCAST EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS
It’s More Than Compliance
Emily Etherington: So it’s all about just fitting your safety program to your needs and, for me, it was really easy for me to get passionate about safety and adopt a safety mindset. That is not just meeting compliance, not just meeting the minimums and checking all the boxes, but really creating a program where you can generate buy-in across the organization and work together as a team to ensure that folks coming into your organization are leaving at the end of the day in as good or better shape than when they left.
The Implications of a Safety Incident
Deb Bridges: People will say, “I don’t have time for safety. It’s too time-consuming.” […] We can definitely go at it from the financial piece, and we can look at the costs of having people get hurt, and I’m not just talking about the personal costs of someone getting hurt, but actual financial costs, and then let’s talk about the personal costs. And then let’s talk about the implication that that has for every single other individual who works for you because someone getting hurt at work affects everyone.
Value and Bottom Line
Emily Etherington: What’s key there is really understanding that it has to be a team of people, and we have to generate that buy-in from the very top down. And the way to do that is oftentimes really tied to what you’ve described. How does this benefit us? How does achieving safety goals and prioritizing safety contribute to all of these other things that we need to do, like retain good people and protect ourselves from risk and liability and costs related to safety and injury and really just operating? When you focus on safety, you tighten up the organization overall, and you bring into focus other things that are going to benefit your company. So, yeah, it’s got to be a mix of the value and the bottom line.
Communicating with Your People
Emily Etherington: I lean towards encouraging leaders to be as transparent as possible. The law does a really good job of prioritizing human health, but we’ve got to communicate that out to folks. […] And the more you can communicate to employees about the general aspects of the law and why it exists and how it impacts them in their role and what they have to do and the variables of the job that they’re executing and the potential exposure that they have, the better. […] We need to be listening to employees and understanding their specific situations. And in a lot of cases, we need to go above and beyond what the law and the regulations expect of us to accommodate employees.
No Matter the Situation
Deb Bridges: It goes back to having a plan. First of all, developing a plan. Let’s start with that. Let’s develop our plan. Let’s train to our plan, and then drill. Whenever I do training on disaster preparedness or even workplace violence, I always ask folks that are in the audience, “How many of you have been in the military or fire department or police?” And I say, “How many drills did you do?” And they’re just like, “Oh, my God, all the time,” right? As humans, that’s the best way for us to prepare because what happens in a disaster situation or workplace violence situation or even a power outage is we sort of go into a little bit of that fight-or-flight — that thinking part of our brain kind of shuts off. And that is where the drills really come in. It becomes automatic. We know what we’re supposed to do.
Effective Execution
Emily Etherington: You need to make this work meaningful. You need to make this work rewarding. You need to generate buy-in from the team that you’re assigning to do this kind of work to help them understand that they are the heroes in this situation. They are the first responders. So, I think in many cases, in order to achieve just putting together the plan and getting it developed — having the steps that you need to take in the event of XYZ all lined out and accessible. […] But then that’s not the end. […] Bring together the people who are going to execute this and be responsible for this. So at every single location where you operate, where you allow people to enter a building or gather, you should have an Emergency Response Plan (ERP) and a team of people who know what the acronym ERP means, every shift — or at least two people who are normally present all of the time — who are your emergency response coordinators and that team of people is trained on what these steps are.
LEARN MORE
Want to reach out to Emily or Deb directly with your safety questions or concerns? Email Deb at deb@safetynorthwest.org or Emily at emily.etherington@xeniumhr.com.